Famous Last Words
by Shrodinger's Pen
Summary: But I found in you, what was lost in me. In a world so cold, and empty I could lie awake, just to watch you breathe. In the dead of night, you went dark on me.
1. Chapter 1

Written: 9/9/2015 - 04:21 A.M.

 **AN:** Title comes from the song by My Chemical Romance of the same name, which came on my Pandora station as i was writing the second chapter and fit with some of the themes I'm going for here. This is the first chapter of a planned three-shot, but after an excited review and a surplus of ideas this is quickly growing into a larger project, so look forward to the next chapter next Wednesday, fair warning though, you're not going to like it much more than this, but give it time, it ends happy i promise.

Edited: 9/24/2015 - 2:31 P.M.

Fixed a glaring timeline problem that i caught, no one pointed it out but that doesn't mean ya'll didn't notice. Also, in lieu of this no longer being a three-shot i changed the summary up a little. The lyrics are from the song Dark On Me by the Starset. All credit where it is due.

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The first time she said good bye to him it broke her heart. She would never forget the sight of him standing outside his father's lavish house; dark green scarf blowing listlessly in the still chilly May air. She'd picked that scarf out for him, she remembered, before the homecoming dance their sophomore year, the first school dance they went to together. It's deep forest tones brought the light out in his eyes, she'd told him, as he tried awkwardly to remind her they were at the shop for her dress. That thought finally released the tears she'd been fighting back for half an hour and she broke down, pulling over not twenty feet down the road from his driveway. She cried for Hiccup, the pain she was causing him and how unfair she was being. She cried tears of anger, hating herself for what she was putting him through, all because of her own selfish fears. He was perfect, and she was... something,; not enough, not to give back what he gave, not enough to love him like he loved her. Finally she was crying for stupid things, like her uncle dying and her dad losing his boat, she needed to cry as much as she hated the thought, and her body was going to make up for lost time. She felt stupid and selfish and sad and she wanted to talk to him. But she couldn't, she'd fucked that up too.

As if God himself were on high, looking down on her and damning her to a customized hell just for her, she heard the distinct jarring crank of a motorcycle's engine turning over. Her head snapped up, lethargic sniffles ceasing and she knew immediately that she had to move. Alas, she also knew there wasn't a snowball's chance she was going to get off this country road before he made it out of his drive way.

She watched the rear view the whole time as she tried to start her shitty Tahoe, failed, tried again pumping the gas, rammed it in gear and started creeping forward. No sooner than she reached idle speed the lean black bike, always far too large for such a slender rider in her opinion, banked around the bend in the driveway and into view. She saw him, as plain as he saw her on the deserted road, he'd taken off the scarf as well as the jeans that she realized she'd bought him three weeks ago; he didn't have a single piece of protective gear on, two years of riding that thing around to her great displeasure and she'd never seen him so much as sit on it without a helmet, jacket, and gloves. Now only the same Call of Duty T-shirt he'd had since before they started dating covered his chest, twice it had survived her attempts to get rid of it, and the oil stained jeans he wore when he worked on his bikes. As if he could read her thoughts, feel her concern, he kicked the gear lever down once and popped the clutch as he passed her. The front wheel lifted off the pavement and it took him three seconds to be at the gentle curve a quarter mile down the road.

She spent that summer before her first year in college in her parent's home, ignoring everyone. Rachel and Scott called her constantly for the first few weeks, she assumed Fishlegs had told his girlfriend what she'd done to his best friend and they were all trying to figure out what the fuck she was doing. She assumed, because she never answered their calls. She called Hiccup every day, sometimes multiple times. She would listen to his voice mail and hang up, or leave one of her own, usually terrible short little things where she tried not to sound like she'd been crying for half a month as she choked out a 'call me back, please?'. He never answered, and he never called back, finally after three weeks she broke and late one night called Fishlegs. Desperate to talk to anyone that may have talked to him.

"Astrid..." It was all he said when he picked up the phone and she wanted to cry again, at the cautious tone in his voice like he was soothing a wounded tiger, and heavy with silent accusations.

"Have you talked to him?" She said after a pause where she tried to figure out her angle, she would not cry while on the phone with Fredrick Ingerman, she would not be weak in front of him.

"... I have." She clenched her jaw, wishing she could reach through the phone and punch him in between the eyes. Must he do this now? Why couldn't he just be helpful and tell her everything he'd heard from Hiccup in the last two weeks, judgment and condemnation on the side. Instead she took a deep breath through her nose and tried to think clearly. Fishlegs held all the cards and raging misplaced frustration at him though the phone would get her nothing but a dial tone.

"Is he alright?"

He didn't answer for a full minute, it became apparent pretty early in the silence that she was not going to like what he had to say. Finally, after a steadying breath of his own he spoke, and with equal parts fear and relief she heard that he sounded fifty shades less stern when he did. "No, Astrid, he isn't. He won't answer my calls, but he's called twice. Once after you..." he trailed off awkwardly but recovered quickly, sparing her the need to finish his sentence, "and again today actually. To check up on … us." She asked the question, but she knew the answer, knew before she called Fishlegs and he confirmed it.

"He won't answer your calls... He left Berk?" Fishlegs didn't bother trying to cover up his mistake, she respected him for that.

"Gobber says his dad knows where he is, probably does himself, but he won't tell us. Just that he's safe." Astrid had to hang up soon, she would not cry in front of him, even if it were over the phone. He seemed to sense this because he hurriedly spoke up, "Astrid, we're all worried about you too, give Rachel a call back soon, she's hysterical, you'd be doing us all a favor."

She couldn't muster even a half-hearted fake chuckle at his attempt at comic relief, just a subdued "yeah, sure." before she hung up. Fishlegs was a good boyfriend, she decided, and in that moment she hated him for it. He wasn't half the boyfriend... She called him for the first time that day then, nine rings she counted, same as every time before his voice mail started and she listened to the well memorized message. She cried for the first time during one of her calls, and begged for what could've been the first time in her life. She begged him to come home, begged to be forgiven, for a call or a text, anything. She told him she would go to Pasadena community colleges and he could go to Cal-Tech, or he could come with her and Ruff and Fish to University of Colorado and they could get married and start a family now, degree or not. She picked apart every argument she had used to convince herself that they couldn't be together until she couldn't speak or sob any longer, and then she told him she loved him and hung up.

The next day she called Rachel when she woke up, they weren't even off the phone before her best friend was banging on her front door and for the first time in what might as well have been an eternity Astrid felt something other than loss and heartache. She sniffed pathetically as she opened the door to allow the tall blonde in and wrapped her arms around her friend's back when she was enveloped in a hug too tight it might've caused lasting damage to her shoulders.

She still called Hiccup every night before she went to bed after that, but she didn't isolate herself at home during the day. She allowed Ruff to show up every morning and coax her out of bed, and they spent the last weeks of summer before they left home catching up with all the friends they might not ever see again. He never called back, and she never wailed into his answering machine again though she did leave a few more messages. Until one night a week before she was to set off for Colorado she called and got the error message that told her the number was no longer connected to a service carrier. She cried over him for the last time that night, in the morning she had to see Ruffnut and Fishlegs off, they were going down to settle the apartment the three of them were going to share. She was not over him, the wounds weren't healed, the blood wasn't even clotted yet. She still bled, a lazily rivulet that fell with every beat of her heart, but she would be fine. She had to be, because it wasn't his fault she felt this way, it was hers.

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 **AN:** Special thanks to my loving girlfriend and Beta reader for this chapter, Shattering Darkness, if you're into the Kingdom Hearts fandom feel free to check out her stories.


	2. Chapter 2

Written: 9/10/2015 - 5:39 AM

 **AN:** So I decided to post this a day early, because i have the next two days off and I'm a little ahead of schedule on writing, I hope no one minds. This takes place two and a half years after the last chapter, during the winter of Astrid's second year of college. I hope everyone likes our new friend, she's going to be around for a little while, if not well... as i said, Hiccstrid all the way.

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Hiccup sighed melodramatically from the booth he shared with Fish, casting a playful look at his girlfriend when she jerked her head up and leveled him with a glare just shy of malicious. He chuckled as she began sweeping under the tables again with more vigor than before, bordering on abusing the trash into the dust pan. He turned back to his game, smacking his keyboard on accident to hastily strafe away from a grenade Fish had lobbed at him in his distraction. "So you wanna play dirty eh?" he muttered to himself, leaping atop a stack of shipping containers and firing a short burst of automatic fire into his friend's avatar, killing him and ending the game. "Yes! I am the greatest, feast your eyes sir, this is man!" he was flexing his none existent biceps and smirking across the tablet at his dejected best friend when Astrid cleared her throat from the previously empty space directly beside him. He jumped to the other side of the booth, restricting his girlish shriek to a semi-wimpy yell of surprise.

"You know, if you _helped_ me instead of sitting here blowing each other up we might actually be able to get out of here in time to catch the first half of the movie." Hiccup took a second to recover his composure as Fishlegs hurriedly packed up his laptop, afraid of further stoking her ire. Hiccup had a nasty habit of playing with fire and sent a chagrined grin toward his frustrated girlfriend, testing the waters before diving in.

"What do you have left to do milady?" She narrowed her eyes at him, crossing her arms broom and dust pan still in hand, and he could practically hear the unspoken 'don't give me that 'milady' crap' passing through her silent look.

"I still have to sweep the bar, put up the clean dishes and roll a bucket of silverware." She said testily, but she was definitely mad at all of her uncompleted tasks rather than him specifically, that gave him the courage to prod at her a bit.

"What was it you said to me the last time I rolled silverware for you?" He adopted a ridiculous falsetto voice and said airily, "the next time I ask you to help me, remind me that I told you the last time you helped me to tell you this." She'd shot out the fist that collided with his left shoulder before he'd even reached the end of his speech, stalking away with a mutter to herself along the lines of 'how does he even remember that nonsense.' He chuckled at her retreating back, watching the sway of her long upbraided ponytail until it whipped around the corner into the kitchen.

"One of these days you're going to fail to keep your mouth shut on the wrong topic and she's going to put you in the ground." Fish warned sagely, but Hiccup didn't reply because at that moment, as he was wiggling the charger loose from his computer a pair of keys collided with the side of his head.

"Ack! What the-" He placed a hand gingerly to his temple and looked back toward the kitchen to see Astrid smirking at him, looking very satisfied with herself.

"Make yourself useful and got get me a change of clothes, and one for you for that matter. It's a date, you're not wearing that Lord of the Rings T-shirt."

"It's Game of Thrones!" He shouted after her, but she was disappearing from sight even before he began, sharing an eye roll with his friend as they hefted all their technology and left the closed restaurant.

Hiccup's eyes snapped open and immediately the room began to spin as his brain failed to focus on the lazy circles the ceiling fan left in his vision. He groaned, tried to sit up and failed, and closed his eyes again taking deep breaths. He hadn't dreamed about Berk in months, not since... but that was best left unmentioned. He pepped himself up with a few deep breaths and wrenched himself into an upright position in bed. Immediately he felt sick, but through shear lethargy alone he managed to quell his raging stomach, even his gag reflex was too drunk today. From the shafts of light infiltrating the heavy hotel curtain windows he could tell that the sun was low in the sky already, he'd slept most of the day away. "Happy birthday to me." He sign-songed hoarsely to himself, even his own voice grating on his ears.

Well, he'd definitely missed his three-thirty flight to Stockholm, he reached around closed-eyed through the sheets searching for his phone. His finger tips brushed smooth skin and he furrowed his brow, cracking open one eye to make note of the person sharing his bed for the first time. She was a beautiful girl, petite with thick blonde hair and smooth ample curves, the sheets wrapped her body in the most alluring way, revealing the slope of her back and one long pale leg. Instantly he remembered meeting her at the kick off party, painted in a gold and scarlet dress, dancing by herself on the edge of the crowd.

He found his phone and checked his lock screen, squinting as the harsh light assaulted his abused eyes. Three missed calls from his manager, seven texts, and an email. He read the texts, and even the email, chuckling to himself at the man's increasingly frantic messages leading up to his missed flight. Only after he brushed his teeth and downed a couple glasses of water with a handful of Advil did he text his boss back, telling him he would be in Sweden by morning, then he turned his phone off and ventured back to bed.

On second inspection the girl was not as pretty as she'd appeared the night before when the vodka was still flowing. Her nose was a little to big for her face in his opinion, not delicate enough to match the rest of her features. When he shook her slightly though and one eye cracked open their deep blue hue was so close that he found he could ignore her nose completely, and the few inches she was missing.

"Morning, Hiccup" she said, and the roughness to her voice was cute, she smiled at him shyly but stretched languidly bearing all to be seen as she kicked off the sheets.

"How did you hear that name?" He asked her, far to entranced with her body before him to care all that much that she'd somehow found out his old pet name.

"You told me last night," She said, giggling at his blank look and the laugh threw him off, too girlish and high pitched. "Don't you remember?"

He rubbed a hand through his mussed hair and gave her a roguish grin. "There's a lot I don't remember from last night."

"You didn't forget too much, I hope." Her voice was husky now, and definitely by design, she sat up too with much more grace than he had been capable of and placed a slender hand on his chest. He accepted the slow kiss she delivered to his lips. She still tasted like the cranberries from her drinks the night before and her name came back to him in a hazy memory of leaning over the bar and ordering her a drink.

"I think I've got the gist of it." He assured her sneaking in for another quick kiss before he stood again to a pouty sigh from her. "I'll get you some water," he offered and he could see the promise of hydration beating out the growing lust in her eyes, she fell back with a sleepy smile and a nod. When he got back to the bedroom glass in hand she was sitting up on the edge of the bed, still naked, pulling her hair up into a ponytail, he stopped in the doorway to take in the scene and in the back of his mind made a decision.

"I've got to take a train to Stockholm tonight," he told her, handing over the glass which she downed greedily. Her brow furrowed over the rim of the cup as she continued to gulp it and his lip twitched up into a smile.

"Why?" She questioned when she'd set the glass down on the nightstand, turning to face him on the bed with her legs curled underneath her. He found himself asking the same question as the silence stretched between them and his eyes raked up and down her front hungrily.

"I uh... I have to test the new brake fluid Kawasaki wants all their teams using this season, there's an R&D track there." She pouted again, he could tell she wasn't too sad, mostly just trying to be cute and it was working well enough.

"But it's your birthday!" She exclaimed in dismay, Jesus how much talking had he done last night? "How can they make you spend your birthday on a train all day?" He climbed into bed, crawling up to her and fingering her hair distractedly.

"By paying me eleven million dollars a year." He said and smiled at her dropped jaw, "Do you want to come with me? To Stockholm I mean." He continued to rake his fingers through the cascade of golden hair, it was soft and fruity smelling and he found it much more appealing to watch it instead of her face as he waited for an answer.

"Do you really want me to, Hiccup?" The hope in her voice was real, even he knew that much, and the bright look in her too-dark blue eyes seemed genuine to him. He met those eyes and studied them for a minute before he answered.

"I think I do Cami." She squealed in delight and jerked him down to the bed on top of her, pressing her lips to his with fiery passion. Hiccup was startled but enthused, deciding as he slipped a knee between her thighs and fisted a handful of her hair that they could take the next train out, whats an extra hour or two really?

He still needed to talk to her about using his real name, the stigma of Hiccup was something he'd worked hard to leave behind in the States, but that could wait, they had a long train ride ahead of them. He'd never spent more than a night with the girls he met at the track parties, he'd never met one that seemed worth more than sharing a night of passion with. There was something about this one, something he was very aware of but had zero intention of acknowledging, that set her apart. He didn't know what he was getting himself into yet, inviting her onto the road with him, but that was yet another thing that would have to wait. She'd started calling out his irksome nickname in time with his thrusts and when he closed his eyes he could imagine another's voice and he lost himself to pleasure soon after.

He was surprised with how easy it was to be in the girl's company, the train ride was spent lazing in his stateroom, drinking tequila and watching a Romanian movie neither of them could understand. They adopted their own voices for the characters and filled in the plot as they saw fit as they got drunk well into the night. It was... refreshing. He couldn't recall the last time he'd spent so long in the presence of someone that wasn't strictly work, or strictly pleasure. While she did technically fall into the latter category he could see himself actually liking her, the thought was more appealing now than it had been in the last three years. He watched her as she stared ahead, delivering a long winded diatribe in a flawless British accent that didn't at all fit with the dingy alley where the woman on screen was actually standing. He wondered if she was from England, if that were her actual accent, and found he wouldn't mind finding out. Again he decided to think about these things later, instead clearing his throat to do his next lines in a high pubescent voice for the burly man pressing the woman deeper into the alley. In the wee hours of the morning, droopy eyed from their drinks they curled up in the small bed and napped for the last few hours of the trip.

They arrived with the rising sun in Sweden. Hiccup's bags had all been taken from the hotel for him and delivered ahead of him but Cami had only a small leather purse and the dress she'd worn the night before. They climbed into the sleek black Cadillac waiting for them at the curb, the stoic driver saying nothing to the haggard looking couple. The two of them talked in quiet voices to each other for the short ride, making plans to get lunch at a pub Hiccup always visited when he came to the city. When they stopped at the gate house out front of a large office complex Hiccup reached up and handed the driver his credit card. "Take the lady shopping for a new wardrobe." The mystified look on the girl's face when he handed her a second sleek black credit card was reward enough in his eyes.

"Just try to have her back by noon," he told the driver, still looking at her, she lunged forward and kissed him fiercely breaking away with a blinding smile.

"The hell have you been?" Eret demanded when he made the it up the long drive to the complex doors, "Jesus, you look like you've been fucking whores since I saw you last," he checked his watch "thirty hours ago."

"Just the one, thank you," he said dismissively, as they fell into step together and headed straight through the building to the track that was visible through the glass walls on the far side. "And she's less of a whore than the women you pull off the track and take back to your room." He grouched defensively.

"She must've been quiet the lay," He said suggestively, a lecherous grin making its way onto his face. "I saw you leave the party with that blond girl before midnight. It was almost eighteen hours before you texted me back yesterday, and you _still_ have sex hair."

"She was a good lay, that's why I brought her with me, so in my defense my 'sex hair' is left over from the train ride, not Barcelona."

"Fucking hell Haddock, don't go soft on me now, you're the best wingman I've had in years."

"Yeah, yeah, you'd be lost without me I'm sure." He said sardonically.

"Well... let's not get carried away now, I'm just saying the loss would be felt is all." Hiccup rolled his eyes and ducked into the bathroom to change into some lighter clothes, Eret waited outside and fell on him with a new round of questions as soon as he stepped out in a thin T-shirt and basketball shorts.

"What about that girl back home?" He asked, immediately Hiccup was weary of the conversation. He didn't talk about his life in the U.S., not in any significant way at least, he felt like a different person here than he had in Berk and mixing the two felt like a dangerous game. Whether the man he'd grown into was better or worse than the boy he'd left in Washington was up for speculation, all he knew was what he had now didn't hurt. Not like thinking about her had.

"There is no girl back home," he said flatly, deciding in that moment that he was not going to have this conversation with his womanizing best friend. "You should know, you've been there for half my sexual misendeavours over the past two years."

"What about that blond girl that's on your phone? The one on your lock screen?" Hiccup froze, one leg in his leather racing suit.

" _You're_ in my lock screen picture," he said harshly, presenting his phone as proof, showing the picture of the two of them piss drunk in an English pub. He hoped he made his silent threat clear, stop talking. Now.

"Not that phone," he said exasperatedly, "the other one that you never use, just carry around with you all the time." Hiccup leveled his friend with the blackest glare he could manage.

"There's no girl back home," he said with finality, ripping the zipper up on his suit, he crammed his helmet over his head, and glared through the tinted visor. "Not anymore." Hiccup didn't like the new break fluid. It worked, it was amazing actually, and in theory he could appreciate it's practicality on the track, faster breaking meant less time for decceleration before the heavy turns. He could see himself shaving a whole two or three seconds off his lap time with this, which in motorcycle racing could mean the difference between first place and last. Still he was used to the old stuff, he could take his ZX-10R down a mountain road at eighty miles an hour, he had in the Swiss Alps last spring. It was good enough for him, but Kawasaki wrote the checks and so got what they wanted.

"You want to run it again?" Eret called from the pit as he propped his bike up on the kickstand and removed his helmet. "You came out at a second and a half under your best time for this course, but I saw you take the third turn too wide for sure, we can get a better time." Hiccup was already shaking his head, propping his helmet up under his arm and unfastening the buttons at his throat to let some air into the infernal suit.

"Save something for the race," He said, grinning at his friend to try and show him he wasn't upset anymore, riding always cleared his slate. "If they get all the impressive results in practice they get bored during the races." Eret smirked and swaggered over to him.

"Yeah, well they put about half a billion dollars into this brake fluid, I think they may want a little excitement from the test results too." Hiccup just shrugged.  
"And a second and a half should be good enough for them, _I'm_ fine with the old formula." Eret sighed dramatically.

"I swear, sometimes you're more trouble than you're worth, these corporate execs don't want to hear that they've wasted their time. Do me a favor, just if someone does ask about it, don't tell them that you'd just as soon use the stuff they sell at Autozone, please?"

"Don't worry," Hiccup soothed, waving away his manager's concern, "I'll play nice, talk up the new formula and show some excitement. It's not my first day you know."

"Yeah yeah, so what're we doing for lunch then?" He was about to going into the drawn out process of selecting something they could both agree on when Hiccup headed him off.

"I'm actually meeting up with Cami, she should be here any second." he looked up at the sun, as if he had ever been any good at gauging the time that way, but it might as well have been midnight for all the information that gave him.

"Cami." His friend said chuckling, and trying to give him a high five, Hiccup quirked an eyebrow at him and made no move to return it.

"What are you on about?"

"Mate," Eret clapped a hand on his shoulder and began to steer him back toward the office building, "There's not a broad out there named Cami that _isn't_ a slut." He said it so matter-of-factly that Hiccup actually had to laugh at the ridiculousness of the statement.

"You know whats sad is a think you actually believe that." Eret was nodding solemnly.

"I've come across two Camis in my travels," he began, with the air of someone who was about to share a grand nugget of wisdom, "fucked 'em both." Hiccup barked out a laugh and shook his head, not quiet sure why he was surprised.

"Well I have to give you credit, you remembered their names at least." Lord knows he didn't. "You're about to meet a third," he said, spotting the black luxury car waiting far off at the end of the drive, "so now your statistics all wrong, only sixty-six percent of Camis are sluts."

"We'll see, I bet _Cami_ wouldn't mind a little Ménage à trois." Hiccup shook his head again,

"Your french needs work," he said flatly, "and that is not happening. Her feelings on polygamy aside I don't think I want to open that door in _our_ relationship just yet."

"If ever there was a man's prick I would want entering a woman at the same time I was, it would be yours."

"Aaand on that note, I'm going to go have burgers with a woman... alone." He shirked his way free of his friends hand on his shoulder, turning when the man stopped and shouted out:

"You better not be taking her to the pub!" At his shout of 'yep!' Eret stamped his foot and whined in a pathetic shout "That's _our_ place!" Hiccup laughed.

"You need to get out mate, find yourself another Cami, you're coming off a little too strong for me right now." He didn't walk immediately out to the car when he was free of Eret at the door. He lingered out front, debating silently for a second before he took a few steps off the path and out of sight of the vehicle in the distance. The weight of the phone in his pocket was unrecognizable after so long without use, but when he reached in it was there. The technology was severely outdated, the case all scratched and scuffed from his years of use but when he hit the lock button the screen lit just fine and there she was smiling out at him from underneath the ever uncooperative bangs over her eyes. He spent a second drinking in the image, relishing in the now familiar hitch it in his breath it caused then unlocked the phone with a practiced swipe of his thumb.

He couldn't use the device anymore, it hadn't been connected to a service plan in years but he navigated to the music player, bringing up a long list of audio files. He threw a hasty glance toward the car as he selected one, reassured when he saw that it hadn't moved yet. He held the phone up to his ear and listened.

"Hey Hiccup," his eyes fell closed of their own accord, her voice washing over him caused a physical change in his state of being, he leaned against the wall of the building and listened. He'd heard the message at least a hundred times, he'd heard all of them, could recite the words with her and count the seconds in her pauses, hear the words left unsaid in her sentences. "I leave for Colorado in a little over a week," pause, "call me? If you get back in town before then, that is, I'd love to see you... before I go." She stopped for a second here, it was one of the only things he wondered about in the call, was she crying? Or was she simply giving up on ever getting a response out of him? It was one of the last voice mails she'd left, and probably the shortest, after a few seconds of silence that they shared she heaved a deep breath and said "I love you." then she was gone. He stared at the list of all her missed calls for a minute after the recording ended, then on a whim held the button down and turned the phone off, slipping it back in his pocket. With a deep breath that matched her own he kicked off the wall and set out for the car. He had a pretty blonde waiting, and a date with the best burger he'd found this side of the Atlantic.

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 **AN:** I'm really digging both Cami and Eret in this chapter, as a reader i hate it when authors present a valid rival love interest but i think I'm going to spend a little time with her, she's not the bad guy here and this story has the potential to flesh out nicely i think. That's what makes fanfiction so great anyway right? The emotional torture.


	3. Chapter 3

Written 9/14/2015 5:56 AM

 **AN:** technically (according to my timezone) got this up in time, so you won't have to deal with this flashforward effect much longer, once i hit about chapter five everything will start to flow more linearly, bear with it. We're back with Astrid, midterms of her senior year in college.

* * *

Astrid tapped the eraser of her pencil nervously against the scantron, surveying the blacked out bubbles with a furrowed brow. She glanced up at the clock, with four minutes left she leafed through the test again for a final time, there were corners folded on every page she'd skipped a question but only two now, she stopped on a question on buoyancy and scowled at it. Buoyancy was supposed to be easy, of all the asinine backwards shit her physics teachers had tried to feed to her over the years it at least kind of made sense. She didn't even know what this question was asking for though, with a sigh she puzzled at it for a few more seconds. Silently she cursed the lack of Hiccup in her life for what felt like the millionth time this semester, looking back she realized he was the only reason she passed physics in high school and giving up on finding the answer she skipped to the next one. Another minute staring blankly at the question about point charge in a magnetic field and she tossed the test away in exasperation, bubbling C in the only empty spots. She felt good as she sat out the last two minutes of the exam period. For better or worse she was officially done with Physics 1302, and thus science for her college career.

The resolution felt good as she left the class and bypassed the cafe on her way out the door, she'd put the class off as late as she could knowing it was going to kick her ass. Intellectually and emotionally. The idea should have been laughable to her, but that was before her reedy old professor started dragging on in a nasally voice and made her feel _things_. She knew more about this teacher than she did any of her others because every anecdote and off topic backstory story was painfully reminiscent. She already knew who Nikola Tesla was when he spent half the class period talking about his lab in Colorado, she knew that Albert Einstein published his most significant work two decades before World War II and had no part in the actual production or planning for the Manhattan project. She'd nearly cried for the first time in years when he busted out an old and well worn copy of Richard Fyenman's Lectures on Physics to quote it on the board, containing herself through sheer willpower alone. It was bittersweet though, she could kind of see the appeal that Hiccup had tried so desperately to reveal to her all those years ago, there was a beauty to the systematic explanation of the sciences. She just never had the mathematical prowess to match him when he started explaining modern physical theories she couldn't even spell let alone comprehend.

"Astrid!" She blinked and turned to see Ruff jogging unsteadily across treacherous icy grass toward her. When had she gotten outside? "Jesus woman, I've been chasing you halfway across campus." Had she?

"Sorry, I'm a little..."

"Distracted, yeah, there's a shocker." Astrid furrowed her brow, frowning at her friend as they fell into step together toward the east parking lot. "So, how'd your exam go?" Astrid groaned exaggeratedly and finally the euphoria of being free of Physics class hit her.

"Terrible, thank god that's over! I swear if I ever hear about a mass on an inclined plane again it'll be too soon." Ruff cracked a grin and threw an arm around her shoulders.

"That's my girl! Let's celebrate!" Astrid swore she rebutted, she knew what Ruff meant when she said celebrate and they had to leave for Berk the next morning, regardless she found herself in the packed college bar all the same.

"To finals!" She was shouting over the noise of the bar, raising her shot slightly, Astrid raised hers and they clinked them against Fishlegs' and down them in one fell swoop. Fishlegs choked but his girlfriend just punched him in the chest and forced the second one on him.

"To a lazy final semester of English and Art Appreciation!" Astrid purposed, raising her own second shot but the other two just glared at her.

"I still have to take chemistry next semester." Ruff ground testily while Fishlegs said:

"Yeah right, I have abstract Geometry _and_ linear Algebra!" She just smirked and shrugged at them before drinking the burning clear liquid un-toasted. She lounged in the tall bar chair tucked into the corner, inspecting the drunken crowd of college kids celebrating the end of another semester, she blamed the alcohol for the sappy sentimentality she was feeling. Soon she would be gone, off to make something of herself however one did when they studied Political Science in school. It had not been her first choice, originally she'd picked Sport's Medicine because she was there on a soccer scholarship. Admittedly in her freshman year she hadn't thought of much other than soccer, what was the point in nitpicking over a major when she was going to be a professional athlete? Fucking idiot. After her knee injury in the spring semester of her second year she'd switched to business, without her scholarship she had to take out student loans to stay at CU. Business seemed like a good safe bet, something to ensure a job on the outside that could pay off the mass of debt she now found herself in. She hated it though and as the shock of her injury and the end of her sports career wore off she decided if she was going to pick a path for the rest of her life it should at least be something that didn't make her want to throttle her professors.

Funnily enough it was Steven Haddock that provided the answer. She made the trip back home every winter for break with her two best friends/roommates; that first break after her injury she ran into the man at Mildew's hardware store, and after a few minutes of semi-awkward conversation where both tried their absolute hardest to avoid mentioning a certain gangley genius they shared, he invited her to dinner the day after Christmas. It was a small, sad, affair; just her, Gobber, and Mr. Haddock himself, who was only in town for three days then back to Seattle on business. Astrid had spent weeks, maybe months collectively, in the manor with Hiccup and Stoick and sometimes alone and the large empty house felt just as comfortable as her own home, even now. She ate with her former-future-father-in-law and old soccer coach and the three of them ignored the missing link the way they knew best. Sports. They talked about her injury, likelihood of a full recovery, and what she was going to do next. It was the most she'd spoken aloud about it up to that point, certainly in front of others, but at that table she was not pitiable or odd. They were all athletes that couldn't play anymore, really Gobber was the only one with any right to complain, at least she and Stoick still had all their extremities. Stoick offered her a job under him, quite the job for a girl fresh out of college with no work experience apart from waiting tables at Gobber's in high school and throughout college. She didn't want to take it though, getting handed a job working for the Governor because she used to sleep with his son felt … lazy. Among other things. She told him she would have to think about it, but by the time she got back to school she'd made up her mind.

"I swear to god if you space on me tonight I'm going to beat you!" Astrid glanced to her friend with a cocked eyebrow, taking her eyes off the bulky guys huddled around the pool tables.

"What's so important about tonight?" She asked, looking to Fish but he just shrugged unhelpfully.

"Nothing! There just has to be _one_ night in _all_ of your time in college where you have _fun_." This brought the frown back to her features as she looked on at her tipsy friend.

"I have fun," she defended, but it sounded weak to her own ears.

"Astrid, watching Battle Star Galactica and Big Bang Theory while you kill a bottle of Tequila is not having fun, its sad." Astrid's jaw dropped in indignation, words failing her for a moment.

"You do that too!" She finally managed, jabbing an accusatory finger into her friend's breast, " _we_ do that," she continued, gesturing to the three of them "don't make me out to be some pathetic drunkard, I never hear you complaining when Sherlock comes on."

"Details!" Ruff waved her words away dismissively, having another six shots delivered to them. "Not tonight, tonight we're going to get irresponsibly drunk and _you_ are going to find one of _them_ " she swept the bar with her finger "to take back to our apartment and do nasty things to." Astrid's eyes rolled skyward automatically, a tired sigh escaping of it's own accord.

"Not this again," she muttered to herself before fixing Ruff's excited foggy eyes with a level stare. "first of all _any_ level of intoxication is irresponsible, we have to be awake at five in the morning tomorrow, we each have to drive eight hours to get back to Berk." Ruff did some quick math on her fingers and cut in.

"It does not take twenty-four hours to get back," Astrid cut back across her, raising her voice slightly.

"No, it takes sixteen. I already know _you'll_ be incapacitated." Ruff just shrugged.

"What can I say, travel just doesn't agree with me."

"It's the vodka that doesn't agree with you babe," Fish offered, sharing a look with Astrid, "honestly I think you just get drunk to avoid having to drive anywhere." Astrid was inclined to agree but Ruff punched him again and he saw the sense in keeping out of this one. She couldn't blame him, Ruff seemed to be leaning pretty heavily on the Astrid-needs-fun angle and it was usually best to go along with her when she got like this.

"Rachel Thorston!" Astrid shouted over her friend, a few minutes later when she could take no more of her suggested potential targets for her night of aimless passion. The real name had the desired effect of shutting her up. " _I love you,_ but if you don't lay off I swear on all things holy I will punch you so hard in the stomach you'll throw up the fifty dollars worth of liquor I just watched you force down." She huffed out a breath, the other two eyeing her wearily from across the table. "I've had an … eventful day, so you have thirty seconds to talk about _anything_ else or I'm going to go get a bottle of cheap tequila and watch Game of Thrones until we leave tomorrow. Your choice." There was awkward silence but Fishlegs quickly alleviated it with more alcohol and soon Ruff was worrying over her Economics exam.

"I'm telling you," she said when they were all a little drunk and Astrid had cut herself off, "If I have to take that fu-" her swear was lost in a foul smelling burp that had Astrid craning away from the table in disgust "-ing class a third time I'm just going to drop out."

"You'll do fine babe, you scored an eighty-five on my practice test, and I'm sure mine was harder than the one you took."

"Yeah," She responded in a flat tone, narrowing her eyes at him. "It was, but Astrid spilled the beans I know I actually got a sixty-two on that stupid thing." He chuckled nervously casting his eyes to Astrid for help but she just returned the shrug he'd given her earlier, smiling winningly in his direction. Stifling a yawn Astrid hopped off the chair and pulled her jacket off it's back.

"I think I'm done for the night guys," She said, casting a longing look at the snowy night through the windows. Ruff protested vehemently, starting to get up presumably to man handle her back into her chair but Fish swooped in and distracted her. He sent a nod in her direction and with a silently mouthed 'thank you' in his direction she made her way out of the overcrowded building. That, she concluded, was why Fishlegs was her best friend. Before Hiccup … during high school they had never had much need to be all that close, they were dating each other's best friends, the mutual understanding they shared from dealing with their significant other's often times ridiculous eccentricities was all they needed. After … when college started though, she quickly found that Fishlegs handled her moody days and appreciation of solitude a lot better than Ruff. She knew her friend loved her, and for the most part she was just worried, but three and a half years seemed not to be enough time for Rachel to grasp that being content in bed with a good book and possessed of the self control not to throw herself at every college frat bro that crossed her path did not mean she was depressed. In those moments she was eternally grateful for Fish's presence in their apartment, something that she had not been at all thrilled with in the wake of the terrible summer after graduation.

Astrid loved the snow, she hadn't always growing up in Washington, his birthday was in the winter and it had always been his favorite time of year and slowly that had rubbed off on her. The air was still and cold, the white flurries temporarily halted leaving a smooth white blanket across the world.

"How?!" Hiccup was laughing at her incredulous outburst, reaching out to grab her hand and tug her along down the sidewalk.

"What do you mean how?" He queried defensively.

"We live in Berk!" She explained, smiling in spite of herself and lacing her fingers through his, "It snows nine months out of the year and hails the other three."

"I think that's a _bit_ of an exaggeration." He said flatly, but continued on in his defense of winter. "Look around," she did, the snow on the roads that ran through downtown was untouched by cars, a million points of light gleaming from the ground. The snow had mercifully stopped for the time being, no one was out on such a cold night so close to Christmas, everyone else had too much sense.

"Okay..." she trailed when he didn't continue, she turned back to him and stilled when she saw that we was staring at her intently, not the winter landscape. "What am I supposed to be looking at?" he blinked at her slowly and didn't answer right away.

"It's... pretty. Serene and peaceful." She got the impression that he'd had more to say on the subject a few seconds ago, but she was now at a loss herself as to what she'd planned to say next. Steeling her nerves she leaned in and planted a quick kiss to his lips, they both blushed slightly at the still new sensation and continued walking.

"I guess, yeah," She conceded, looking around at the snow banks lining the sidewalk with a new appreciation that had nothing to do with their serenity. "let's go back to my house though, pretty or not I still hate the cold." He chuckled in that way he usually reserved for when she was being difficult and she punched him lightly in the arm out of habit.

Astrid came up short at her front door, not quite sure where the walk home had gone. She stood outside, looking down the hallway in either direction at the rows of doors but she was alone. Frowning slightly she shook herself, deciding she'd had one too many drinks and fished her keys out of her jacket pocket. She stripped down to comfortable around-the-house clothes right inside the door and made straight for her room. In bed she fiddled with the idea of turning on the T.V. and watching Netflix until she passed out, but she couldn't bring herself to do it, she glanced for the third time that minute at her phone on her night stand. Groaning in resignation she kicked the comforter off and stalked into the kitchen, she slammed a glass on the counter, poured a generous amount of vodka into it and topped it off with orange juice. Back in the safety of her room, wrapped in the blankets with her back against the wall with drink in hand she finally pulled up YouTube on her phone and navigated to her list of favorited videos. Fishleg's had sent her a link to one of them a few weeks ago, she hadn't known why at first, mostly just confused and hurting, until she saw it. She didn't skip to the end this time, looking out for the rider covered in Red Bull logos. She saw him first on the second lap, leaning over the asphalt in a tight turn, his knee scrapping the ground. Next he was flying down a straight away ahead of the others, out pacing the man operating the camera who seemed torn between following him and watching his competitors who stuck closer together in the back. From there he was in almost every shot, white leather racing suit, black helmet with a green visor and solid black bike. He seemed to be sponsored exclusively by Red Bull, their red and blue logo embelished across the planes of his chest and back, she imagined he was ecstatic about that, probably still drinking entirely more than was healthy.

She took a tremulous breath as she neared the end of the video, she watched him race across the finish line and lay on the brakes. He kicked the kickstand down, jumped off the machine, ripped his helmet off, and fell to his knees with triumphant fists in the air. A man, just shorter than him but much stockier, vaulted the barrier and ran at him in full sprint they collided and in seconds he was hoisted in the air. She jabbed her phone with her thumb, pausing on his beaming face. The image quality was poor, the camera obviously far away, but she would recognize that smile anywhere. Her drink was long gone by this point, taking her past buzzed into the realm of honest-to-god drunk. She sighed again, staring longingly at the screen, she didn't have to scroll down to the description to know everything it could offer her, the video was shot in Qatar, during last year's MotoGP quarter finals. She didn't know how long she sat there, eventually her eyes became heavy and at some point against her will she drifted into sleep.

* * *

 **AN:** I'm trying really hard not to make her come across as constantly weepy, she doesn't cry all the time, we're just seeing the bad moments. She's just a different Astrid than cannon right now, wait until later on when things are going her way a little more.


	4. Chapter 4

Written 9/15/2015 10:54 P.M.

 **AN:** sorry this is a day late, people keep quitting at work and i keep getting called in, i was sitting down to revise this chapter yesterday morning when they called me. but the overtime is nice.

* * *

"So how's linear algebra?" Hiccup peaked over the edge of a felled helicopter, surveying the jungle's edge sprawling up the valley slope through his scope. He did not get a reply immediately, but he'd just caught sight of the lens glare shinning in the canopy across the valley. He steadied his breathing with the press of his thumb and adjusted the optics until they were dialed in as magnified as he could focus them. He could just see the shadowy outline of the sniper lying in the bushes just inside the jungle, he checked to be certain he had one in the chamber then released the round with the gentlest pull of his finger. The bullet arched high and to the right, falling and drifting back left with gravity and air pressure and landed true, ending his would-be killer.

"Oh come on!" His friend finally responded, his shouting coming crackly and piercing through his sensitive headset, Hiccup only laughed and boost jumped high into the air to look for his respawning foe. "I shot first, that was definitely my kill."

"Not from where I'm sitting," he stated smugly, catching sight of his friend running through the forest path where the river entered the map. "Your shot didn't even register." he pulled the trigger again, ending the soldiers life for the second time in a row.

"Sometimes I don't even know why I play with you," Fishlegs complained but the next kill was his and they finished out the game free of trash talk or idle chit chat.

"You never answered me, how's linear algebra going?"

"Ugh," he groaned, "Don't remind me." Hiccup quirked an eyebrow in surprise as he stared at the lobby list waiting for the next game to start. "I think I may have actually found a branch of mathematics that I _truly_ won't ever need to know." He sounded lost and confused.

"No," he gasped in false shock. "Fish what are you saying? This is _linear algebra_ we're talking about, how else are you going to calculate the minute changes in the moon's trajectory around the Earth due to meteorite strikes?" Hiccup's voice oozed sarcasm, he could practically hear his friend's grumpy annoyed countenance through the silence.

"Yeah yeah," he finally replied as the game started, "keep your voice down," he said in a low hushed whisper "my roommates just got home." Hiccup's jaw shut with an audible snap and he played the game in silence, focusing on scanning the map, strafing, diving, rolling and shooting with all his might. He failed miserably. For every kill he got on an enemy they got him twice, Fish had killed him eleven times himself. He heard every muffled sound as Fishlegs' girlfriend and her friend shuffled around the house, their words unintelligible through his friend's microphone.

"So you still haven't told her?" He asked when Fish signaled the all clear, he was watching himself die in the final kill cam, crouched in the open he'd been knifed from behind completely unaware. Pathetic.

"I'm waiting for the … opportune time." Fish said, the nervousness clear through their poor connection, Hiccup sighed in exasperation.

"In a few months time you'll both be graduated from college, I think it's going to be pretty inopportune when you two start to plan a life together and she wakes up one day and realizes that you're not actually paying the bills with your job as an accountant but rather pursing your master's degree in cosmology."

"That's the beauty of it," He explained excitedly and Hiccup got a bad feeling about what was going to come next. "my bachelor's degree is in mathematics, sure I can't be a true accountant or anything but I can get a job somewhere, theoretically she wouldn't have to find out about it until at least … I get my PhD."

"That's the stupidest thing I've ever in my life." The door to his suite shut with a bang and Hiccup looked up, "look, I've got to go, you have to tell your girlfriend you're going to grad school. The longer you wait the worse this is going to be."

"Hiccup wait, there's something I have to tell yo-"

"Tell me tonight, I have to go" He was still talking rapidly into his mic when Hiccup took his headset off just as Came and Eret entered the living room.

"Have you been sitting in that chair since I left this morning?" Cami asked in reproach, bouncing across the room to drop a kiss on his head on her way to the bedroom. Hiccup checked his phone and saw that he had in fact been sitting in front of the T.V. for nearly six hours, hastily he made up a lie and called after her.

"Of course not, I just sat down really, been doing lot's of stuff today." Her head poked out the door, disbelief etched clear across her face, her hair disheveled from her state of mid-undress. She gave a skeptical 'uh-huh' and disappeared back into their bedroom. He glanced up at Eret who was rummaging in their fridge lamenting the lack of 'real beer'.

"We're going to a party being held in _our_ honor, you don't need to start drinking now, there will be plenty of alcohol there I promise."

"Tell me again why I have to go to this thing?" Eret complained, turning away from the fridge with a whole strawberry clamped in his teeth.

"Because Red Bull is throwing their season kick off party and we work for them. Attendance is compulsory."

" _You_ work for them," he corrected, face lighting up for a second, " _I'm_ just your manager, your account with Red Bull is just a small facet of my job, our interaction is minimal at best."

" _We_ work for them," he over ruled, "Or had you forgotten that I worked you into my endorsement contract this year?"

"Take the money, I don't even want it," Hiccup didn't believe that for a second, just rolled his eyes and stood.

"Go get dressed," he commanded, exiling his friend into the hallway so that he could change himself. Cami was seated at the vanity when he entered their room, applying a generous amount of mascara to her full eyelashes.

"Is he getting ready?" She asked, not looking away from her reflection.

"One can only hope," he said wearily and disappeared into the closet. The space was relatively bare, as empty as a closet ever was when Cami was traveling, they'd only packed for the weekend. He unzipped the hanging suit bag and pulled free the expensive Italian suit with apprehension.

"Tell me again why I had to buy another new suit?" He called through the door as he dressed, stressing over the jade green tie and trying to tuck the matching pocket square in just the right position.

"Because you've grown two inches since you tailored the last one and it looks ridiculous." she said matter-of-factly as he emerged into the room again.

"And why did it have to be a twelve thousand dollar suit?"

"Because you're filthy rich and deserve only the nicest of things." She said sweetly, planting a chaste kiss on his lips and dancing across the room to gather her purse and phone. She looked so good in her emerald dress that he found he _could_ over look it's ungodly price, it's not like he spent his money on anything important anyway.

The party was a droll affair, made slightly better by Eret's tipsy good humor and shenanigans. There were a few of the rider's that raced under Red Bull's colors that Hiccup got along with well enough. Heather, a woman a few years his elder was there but he didn't get much chance to talk with her because Cami always insisted that she looked at him wrong and did her best to keep them separated whenever possible. Others, like Dagur who raced for Honda and seemed to have it out for Hiccup, were a few shades less savory. Hiccup as a general rule stuck with Eret by the bar and sipped terrible liquor watching the minutes tick by as free of conversation as the two could manage, aside from their own sidebar of course. Cami loved the public side of his career, she would flit from group to group and occasionally swing back by their secluded table and check up on them. He figured it was good at least one of them enjoyed it, if it were left to him and Eret they would never find endorsement deals, it was a wonder how they'd ever been endorsed at all really.

"I swear mate, that girl's going to get you seventeen million on next years contract out of those old blighters tonight." Cami was chatting animatedly with a few graying men in pristine suites seated at a table by the stage closest to the D.J.. "How you ever found yourself a girl like that is beyond me," Hiccup contemplated the query for a second, furrowing his brow and turning to his friend.

"The same way you find all your girls, you just do away with them before the opportunity to learn anything about them presents itself."

"Well isn't this the pot calling the kettle black," Eret exclaimed in indignation, "so some layover lay tags along for a little while and all of a sudden your standing up there on high pissing judgment down on the lower folk." Eret articulated with his hands dramatically, accenting his tirade.

"It's been over two years," Hiccup pointed out sardonically, Eret simply rolled his eyes and waved a hand in his face.

"The point is, you were right there with me 'till you met this one mate, watch your tone." Hiccup rolled his eyes but didn't fight him, taking a sip of his iced whiskey and surveying the crowd once more. Normally he would find someone interesting to point out and he and Eret would come up with rather unfaltering assumptions about their personalities, traits, familial history, and all around well being but tonight his heart wasn't in it. Tonight he had a small, square, velvet box in his pocket that felt as if it weighed a ton. He slipped his hand in his pocket and fingered the case, it's weight pressing on his mind.

He hadn't looked at the ring itself in years, not since shortly after he bought it, right after graduation. He could remember every detail of it as if he'd bought it yesterday, it had been picked out perfect for another girl. He didn't know why he didn't just go buy a new ring, a bigger, slightly more expensive one, or perhaps he did and just didn't want to think about it all that much but he pulled it out and opened once more. The ring sat in black satin, a thin silver band that split into thinner braided strands at the top on either side of a slender oval diamond, nestled among the gaps in the metal on either side of the stone were smaller light blue and amber-orange crystals. Eret looked on the ring with apprehension then back out at the crowd to track Cami's movement through the mob.

"You going to put that to use tonight mate?" He asked, his tone weary, and when Hiccup looked up he saw that Eret was glancing between Hiccup and Cami with a furrowed brow.

"I was thinking about it, you think I shouldn't?"

"Well, I don't know if this is the right place and time friend, if it were me I'd definitely wait until we were back in Europe. You know she doesn't like it here all that much and she's always going on about how romantic Paris is and shit. Best to wait."

"Well well, look at Mr. Romance over here," Hiccup applauded him mockingly, Eret narrowed his eyes. "Maybe it's you who should be in a committed relationship, maybe you should try working on that." Hiccup felt kind of bad about the jab after he'd said it, but he was on the defensive and he never was all that good at containing his barbed tongue.

"Maybe I will," Eret said haughtily, shrugging himself out of his chair and turning to jab a finger at Hiccup. "Stumble out there half drunk and take a knee with that ring and see what happens, I won't. I'll be at the bar when you're done here." He sauntered out, ignoring Hiccup's call of 'maybe I will!'. He did no such thing, he stayed in that seat for a while longer, staring at the ring and thinking about all it's implications and associations, somewhere during that twenty-thirty odd minutes he came to a realization and made a decision. He looked up, catching sight of Cami talking to Heather and what looked like an assistant. He snapped the ring box closed and returned it to its safe storage, with a smile and a small gesture he beckoned her over. He had to do it, not tonight, not here, but he had to. It was the only thing that made sense to do now.

-o-o-o-

Eret strolled the short trip down the street at his leisure, enjoying the chilly spring night. "Doesn't even deserve her, he doesn't." He muttered to himself as he reached the top of the hill and his destination was in sight. It would not have been his first choice in watering holes. In fact if left up to him he would've passed it over for a restaurant not a pub. _Americans_ , he thought _a pub should be a hole in the wall with a dusty analog T.V. and a pack of withered old men inside drinking black beer._ Needless to say this was not what he found. He reached the door with a party of three, ever the gentlemen he held the door open, smoldering at the two ladies that passed through. The massive guy leading up the pack offered a nervous thank you but Eret just nodded, disappointed in his failed seductions. Was he loosing his touch? He ordered a Genius and drank heartily to that worrying thought. He inspected the bar as he drank his first beer, growing depressed at the lack of bang-able chicks, everyone seemed paired off or way to old. He pondered on the age of one of the pretty bar flies huddled around the pool tables with some unsavory looking guys in leather vests when she walked up to the bar.

"Well hello," He hastily offered, leaning on the bar in her direction, he cracked a sly crooked grin and turned on the charms without even really taking in her appearance

"Hello... again," she said awkwardly, standing by the bar uncomfortably while she waited for the woman to finish getting someone else's drink order.

"Have we met before love?" he asked, laying on the accent thick because he knew the women State-side when crazy for it, "'Cause I think I would remember a face like yours." She laughed softly to herself, facing forward, she turned to look at him, changed her mind and turned back, shook her head and faced him again.

"Yeah, you held the door open for me when I came in, gave me that same stupid look you have on your face now." Eret didn't even feel the indignation he should have at her terrible jest. Something was really bothering him about the girl, he gave her a full once over squinting at her figure. "Unbelievable!" She burst out, but he paid her no mind, "Did you seriously just check me out? Now?"

"Hold on," He said raising a hand to stop her rant, "Seriously, have we met before? Name's Eret," She stared blankly at him, "Son of Eret? Northampton? No? I know! Were you that girl dancing in the fountain in Monaco last year? The Grand Prix afterparty?"  
"I have no idea what you're talking about man, vodka tonic," she told the bartender when she arrived, "I've never seen you before in my life." She received her drink and turned to leave, he called out to her, catching her wrist as she walked away. Quick as a snake she snatched his thumb and twisted his hand off her arm, leaving him half out of his bar stool half on the ground whimpering, her friends called her name and she threw his hand away relieving him from his painful bind, he gasped slightly, sitting back up. "Don't touch me," she said coldly and disappeared behind a crowd of people making their way to the bar from the door.

"Crazy bitch," he muttered to himself, shaking his hand and going for a drink to find an empty glass, he raised it in the woman's direction but she sent him a scowl from further down where five people were vying to get their order in first. It was then that he registered his attackers name, "Astrid? … Astrid!" He whipped around, scanning the booths quickly and laying eyes on the table. Two blond girls and the chubby guy who'd thanked him for holding the door open. "... shit."

"You really can't be here!" He said fretfully, standing at their table and casting frequent looks toward the door.

"Oh not this again," the blonde woman rolled her eyes and beat her fist into the table, "look, I'm flattered, really, also very uninterested." Her friends were looking between her and him with looks of confusion, Eret shook his head and pressed on.

"No, you really don't understand, you _can't_ be here." He turned to the guy, "You, you're Fishleg right?"

"Fishlegs" The other blond, not Astrid, replied, "Who are you?"

"Not important," he told her dismissively, "What are you thinking mate? Bringing _her_ ," he gestured at Astrid wildly, " _here?"_

"I couldn't help it!" The big man finally burst out, covering his face in his hands, "He told me not to tell anyone, but they overheard us talking online and ..." he flailed desperately, letting his head thunk to the table. His two companions glared suspiciously at him, not-Astrid raising a fist at the ready.

"What is going on Fish?" Astrid asked, her tone was chilling even to Eret who was not being subjected to it. The first time he answered it was in a mumble so pathetic and low none of them could make anything out, "Say again," Astrid said, a false sweetness coating her words.

"Hiccup's coming! He's in town, we meet up sometimes, but he always told me not to talk about it and I was afraid if he found out someone knew he would stop coming!" He spewed it all out as rapidly as physically possible, in a less bizarre setting Eret would've laughed at the new nickname, instead he paid close attention to Astrid's face, intrigued by what he saw. He knew very little of what happened between the blonde girl and his best friend, just one drunken night where he'd learned her name, and of course the old phone Holland carried around with him, full of old voicemails and pictures. He never talked about her, not even a mention in passing, Eret knew only that Hiccup had loved her, and she'd broken his heart.

What he saw crossing the girls face now wasn't far off from that, and it gave him pause. She didn't seem to know whether to throttle her friend or him, she turned between the two of them for a few seconds before talking a calming breath. "Who are you?" She finally got out, leveling him with a hard stare, but it was not as resolved as before, there was weakness in those pale blue eyes.

"Eret, entrepreneur, manager, and best friend to Holland Haddock, MotoGP world champion." He flourished his arms and bow slightly, grinning.

"And Hi-Holland is coming here? Now?" he nodded solemnly, taking her in in a new light. This was the one? The one that got away? Well that explains Cami, they were practically the same person, on the outside at least. "I have _got_ to get out of here," She said, stress evident in her voice.

"Do you though?" Eret cocked his eyebrow at the other girl at the table, the one who's name he still did not know.

"What do you mean, 'does she?' of course she does." She gave him a wordless look to rival her friend's and he shut up, glancing back to the door once more.

"He's right Ruff," what was it with these people in their nicknames? "I can't do this right now,"

"Maybe this is what you _need_ right now!" She whispered, grabbing her friend's hand.

"Maybe your right!" He exclaimed, turning back to the table, "Have a nice little chat, get some healing done, but not tonight. It is noooot a good night for this." His mind went to the ring, had he actually manned up and done it? He gulped and leaned over the table, talking low and rapid. "Look, I will _pay_ you to leave," he offered, getting skeptical scowls in return. "What's a night with your friend's worth? A hundred thousand? I'll do it, we have a big race in two days and I can't have him a drunken emotional wreck like last time." He ignored their confused looks, the one called Ruff mouthed 'last time?' to her boyfriend with an accusatory look in her eye but he just shrugged.

"Aright fine! I'll go." She snapped, shoving him out of the way to climb out of the booth.

"Charming," He said brightly, all smiles and twinkling eyes again. "I'll get the door for you," she did not seem altogether pleased by the notion, but that did not bother him. He jogged ahead of her angry stride and pushed the door open as she approached, in a panic he pulled the door closed in her face, shoving her back against the wall behind him. "They're here," he hissed and her fist ceased it's relentless pounding against his back, "just stay quite." He pushed the door back open and Hiccup and Cami were a few feet away this time, he smiled brightly at them calling out "About bloody time, I've been waiting for ages mate!" Hiccup gave him and odd look and allowed Cami to cross the threshold first, after he'd followed her through Eret kicked wildly behind him signaling Astrid's escape, she slipped out silently through the door as he let it fall closed stepping toward them. Cami greeted him enthusiastically, as if they'd hadn't seen each other in days or something, but Hiccup had seen the blond head whip out the door. He'd seen her turn back just outside and catch his gaze, he stayed rooted to the spot just inside the bar until Eret came over and shoved him toward the booth where Cami was greeting his old friends. He didn't even fully register that Rachel was at the table, not until Eret leaned in as he guided him toward the table and whispered. "Keep it together mate, it's going to be a long night."


End file.
